> Thanat Tantinam, a colorectal surgeon in Thailand, knows a lot of things from his medical training, like the ins and outs of the human digestive system, or bowel cancer rates. But also: Never eat Kentucky Fried Chicken at work.
> Since he was a medical student, around a decade ago, the American fast food franchise has been the subject of an odd superstition among Thai doctors, many of whom believe that eating its chicken at work will lead to intolerably busy shifts.
> “It’s a serious superstition in some hospitals,” said Dr. Thanat, 35. “Your colleagues might be mad if you bring KFC.”
> He recently tested this theory. Between 2023 and 2024, he and several co-workers at Phatthalung Hospital in southern Thailand, his employer at the time, conducted a randomized control trial of 345 surgical shifts, comparing metrics like case load or estimated blood loss in patients from three groups of surgeons: a group that ate KFC, another that got food from a local brand named Five Star Chicken, and one that ate nothing.
> The study, which was published earlier this year in the Annals of Surgery Open, a medical journal based in Philadelphia, found that eating KFC does not, in fact, lead to more work. But it also left many questions unanswered: Where did the KFC curse come from? And how had it gripped some of the most educated scientific minds in the country, including Dr. Thanat himself?
> “Yes, I still believe it — maybe 80 percent out of 100,” he said. “If someone brought me KFC at work, I would keep it until past my shift.”
Gift link: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/11/04/world/asia/thailand-kfc-c...
> Thanat Tantinam, a colorectal surgeon in Thailand, knows a lot of things from his medical training, like the ins and outs of the human digestive system, or bowel cancer rates. But also: Never eat Kentucky Fried Chicken at work.
> Since he was a medical student, around a decade ago, the American fast food franchise has been the subject of an odd superstition among Thai doctors, many of whom believe that eating its chicken at work will lead to intolerably busy shifts.
> “It’s a serious superstition in some hospitals,” said Dr. Thanat, 35. “Your colleagues might be mad if you bring KFC.”
> He recently tested this theory. Between 2023 and 2024, he and several co-workers at Phatthalung Hospital in southern Thailand, his employer at the time, conducted a randomized control trial of 345 surgical shifts, comparing metrics like case load or estimated blood loss in patients from three groups of surgeons: a group that ate KFC, another that got food from a local brand named Five Star Chicken, and one that ate nothing.
> The study, which was published earlier this year in the Annals of Surgery Open, a medical journal based in Philadelphia, found that eating KFC does not, in fact, lead to more work. But it also left many questions unanswered: Where did the KFC curse come from? And how had it gripped some of the most educated scientific minds in the country, including Dr. Thanat himself?
> “Yes, I still believe it — maybe 80 percent out of 100,” he said. “If someone brought me KFC at work, I would keep it until past my shift.”